Compliance Engineer

Keep companies up to date and in line with government standards.

Quick Stats

Salary Range

$50,000 – $139,000

Data from U.S. Department of Labor

What do Compliance Engineers do?

A Compliance Engineer ensures that products satisfy government requirements, mandates, and criteria. You see, when you’re designing a new product, its aesthetics, cost, quality, functionality, and durability aren’t the only variables worth considering. Thanks to government regulations — which exist to keep products safe for people and for the planet — there’s also the matter of compliance.

In the interest of public welfare, governments have standards for just about everything, from how to build buildings to how to formulate foods to how to power electronic devices. Compliance Engineers make sure those standards are followed.

More specifically, as a Compliance Engineer, you collaborate with other Engineers to make sure your company’s products comply with government standards without compromising their utility, design, or functionality. To accomplish that, you study industry regulations, give Engineers design advice, review product designs from a compliance perspective, then audit and test products to make sure they adhere to applicable standards, contain proper warning labels, and appropriately mitigate risks. Throughout the entire process, you document your procedures so your company can demonstrate, in the event of an audit or lawsuit, that it’s done its due diligence.